by Autumn Reed
But would she? I'd barely seen her since Taco Tuesday, and I was at a loss for what to do now. We'd given her space, we'd tried talking to her, and I just wanted things to go back to normal. Why else would I entertain the idea of buying a multimillion-dollar home with the guys so we could all live together?
Susan's melodious voice wafted to me from the kitchen, clearly making her sales pitch. “It's a gorgeous property with everything a young couple like yourselves could want for entertaining.”
Liam chuckled, and I couldn't wait to hear his response. “We have a girlfriend, but the house is a surprise.”
I rejoined them in time to see a very flustered Susan flapping her hands in the air. “I'm so sorry, I just . . .” She gulped and smoothed her hands down her skirt, the color of her cheeks darkening to a deep pink. “Many of my clients are same-sex couples. I apologize for making the assumption.”
“Liam is quite the catch.” I slung my arm around his neck and grinned, amused by the entire exchange. I wondered how long it would take Susan to realize what Liam had actually said.
He slid out from under my arm. “I'd like to see the rest of the house, unless something came up?” he asked with a raised brow.
“Kara wanted to know if I'd seen Haley, since she's running late for dinner.”
Liam lifted a shoulder. “I'm sure Kenneth kept them late. You know how he can be.”
I nodded in agreement before turning my attention to Susan and clapping my hands. “Now, let's see those walk-in closets.”
She laughed nervously and led the way upstairs to the second level. After we'd finished touring the rest of the property, we returned to the front entry.
“What do you think? Is the location and size what you’re looking for?” she asked, gripping her satchel.
“The location is good, definitely in the area we wanted,” Liam said.
Lest she think we were ready to buy, I interjected. “The size is in line with our needs, but some of the amenities from our wish list are missing.”
She nodded thoughtfully. “I have a few other listings you may be interested in. One isn't far from here, although it’s a bit of a fixer-upper.” She pulled out a tablet and swiped the screen. “Here,” she said, holding it out to us.
I scrolled through the images while Liam looked on from beside me. The house was nice, even if outdated. Fortunately, I could see past bad style to good bones, and it had promise.
“How many bedrooms?” I asked, while Liam excused himself to take a call.
“Seven, and four baths, not including the detached guest house.”
Susan extolled the features of the home, and was explaining her thoughts on the asking price, when Liam rejoined us with a tight smile. Something had him visibly shaken, and I was immediately on edge.
“I apologize, but we have a family emergency. Theo and I have to leave immediately.”
My eyes darted to him, trying to read his face. Family emergency?
“Oh, okay.” She quickly shook our hands. “I hope everything is okay. Please contact me when you're ready to proceed.”
“Thank you for your time. We will.” Liam rushed toward his R8, and I followed on his heels. I could feel the tension rolling off him, and it was only increasing my anxiety. He waited until we were alone in the car before saying, “Haley's missing.”
“What?” My head jerked back, but Liam was already shifting the car into drive, the tires squealing as he sped out of the driveway. I had whiplash, and not just from his impetuous driving.
“She didn't return from the assignment, so Kenneth contacted Patrick. Chase and Knox are at the loft. Jax will meet us there.”
“Missing?” I repeated, still not willing to believe it.
I checked my phone for calls or text messages from Haley. Nothing. Staring ahead, I mentally kicked myself. I should've expected that this was coming, but I'd been in denial, choosing to believe that she would talk to me, talk to us. Fight for us.
We made it to the loft in record time and found Knox and Chase huddled around several laptops spread over the dining table. Jackson had his back turned to us, his ear to the phone. He soon ended the call with a terse goodbye.
“Here's what we know,” Jackson said, addressing the room. “Haley was last seen at the training center around two this afternoon. She left in the Jeep and didn't report back by the five o'clock deadline. She and Kara had plans to meet for dinner, and Kara still hasn't heard from her. Kara will contact us if she hears anything.”
He looked at Chase. “Any luck with her phone?”
“It went straight to voicemail, but I tracked it to the training center.”
Jackson nodded. “We'll deal with it later. Knox?”
“GPS puts her Jeep in a shitty part of San Jose about forty minutes from here.”
I slumped into a chair, feeling numb. How could Haley do this to me? She knew how gutted I was when she vanished to Portland. I couldn't go through this again—the worry, the search, begging her to return, waiting for it to all fall apart.
Jackson continued speaking, but I didn't hear anything until he barked my name, and I snapped to attention. “What?”
“Grab your gear and get in my Jeep. The others will meet us there.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “If Haley doesn't want to be here, I'm not going to force her to return, again.”
Knox and Jackson shared a look before Knox crouched beside my chair. “Look, Theo, I know you've been burned. Trust me, I get it. But I don't think she ran this time.”
I turned to stare at him, assessing eyes that weren't so different from my own. I could see honesty and fear reflected in their depths. The idea of Knox being afraid of something terrified me.
“Jax will explain en route. Please, let's just go. We're wasting precious time.”
Despite my insecurities, my issues with abandonment, I knew that Knox wouldn't beg if it wasn’t important. So, I stood and collected the backpack he'd prepared for me.
Jackson sped down the highway, threading through traffic and passing the city in a blur. He connected a call through the steering wheel, and the phone rang over the speakers.
“Kenneth James.” There was noise in the background, and if I had to guess, he was at a busy restaurant or bar.
“Kenneth, it's Jackson Hart. My team and I are mobilizing to find Miss Jones, and I have a few questions since you were overseeing her assignment.”
“I'd be happy to help in any way I can. She's one of the best students I've ever had.”
My chest warmed with pride at Kenneth's statement. I knew Haley was remarkable, but it was nice to hear someone else recognize her abilities. But then I felt a pang of betrayal, remembering how she'd used her skills to evade us. Maybe she was doing so again on an even more elaborate scale.
Fuck. My thoughts were all over the place.
Jackson didn't comment on Kenneth's praise, instead focusing on the facts. “Can you give me a quick overview of her assignment?”
“Sure. Each trainee was assigned a building to evaluate and was expected to provide a comprehensive security plan. They had to locate the site and complete a form detailing their suggestions within the allotted time.”
“Haley was assigned 18869 Enterprise Drive, correct?” Jackson asked.
“Enterprise Drive? That doesn’t sound familiar, but I’ll have to check the dossier to confirm. I’ll head back to my hotel now and text you the address shortly.”
“Hmm,” Jackson mused. “Okay, thanks. Anything else you can think of that might help?”
“No, but I’ll be sure to let you know if something comes to mind.”
“Thanks, Kenneth. I appreciate it,” Jackson said with an expression I couldn't decipher.
Fifteen minutes later, a text finally arrived with the address for a building on Camden. After a call to Knox, informing him of the new plan, Jackson exited the highway and headed for San Jose. We'd left Chase, Knox, and Liam to scope out the location of the Jeep and retrieve it while we
headed to the address from her assignment. Assuming they didn't find Haley there, Chase would drive the Jeep to the office after swinging by the training center to pick up her phone.
I stared at the white stripes on the highway, disappearing one after another beneath us.
“I don't think she left of her own accord,” Jackson said. “Neither does Knox.”
“Mhmm.” I wasn’t convinced.
“First of all, her room was intact—photos in their frames, guitar in its case, no clothes noticeably missing. The safe was locked and, before you ask, we checked the interior. There was a stack of money inside, as well as a few other items.”
“That doesn't prove anything. She's been shutting us out since the rumors started, and she left her phone at the training center.”
“Maybe it was an oversight.”
I glared at him, and Jackson glanced at me before returning his attention to the road. We both knew Haley was too responsible to accidentally leave her phone, of all things, behind. Was it possible she had forgotten it? Yes, but it wasn't likely.
“What about the Jeep?” he asked.
“What about it?”
“She wouldn't ditch it in a shitty part of town where it could easily be stolen or stripped. She has too much respect for Knox for that.”
“But discarding a thousand-dollar iPhone is okay?”
He sighed. “No, but I've run through all the arguments in my head. And, as corny as it's going to sound, I know in my gut that something's wrong.”
“Yeah, she left. That's what's wrong.” I clenched my jaw.
“No.” He shook his head, his hands gripping the wheel even as he spoke in a calm voice. “She's too invested, too in love with the five of us, to run. And,” he added in a quieter voice as he pulled into a parking lot, “she knows it would tear us apart.”
After Jackson killed the engine, I waited a minute, then followed him to the front of the building. I would never admit this aloud, but Jackson and Knox were usually right. Not all the time, but enough of it, and they both seemed convinced.
I shoved my feelings down deep and allowed myself to consider the alternative. If she hadn't run, then she could be hurt, or worse.
Oh, dear Zeus, what if she needed me and I wasn't there for her? I couldn't live with myself if I allowed something to happen to her. Maybe she had run, and maybe she hadn't. Either way, I had to know.
“You ready to find our girl?” Jackson asked in the dark.
“Hell, yes.”
18
Spinning
Haley
My eyes blinked open, and I immediately closed them, the light somehow too much for me. Why did I feel like I’d been tackled by a grizzly bear?
“¿Estás bien?”
I blinked again and found a young woman hovering over me. Her brows were pinched together with concern, and her mouth was moving too fast for me to process what she was saying. Either that, or the whooshing sound in my ears was drowning out her words.
Sitting up, I instinctively reached for the back of my head and cried out when pain sliced through me. I slammed my eyes shut again as the room started to spin, taking deep breaths to overcome the dizziness and nausea. What the heck happened?
I tried to work backward and struggled to figure out the last thing I could remember. As always, my heart sank as I thought about my fight with the guys. I’d walked away from them at dinner, and Liam had snuck into my room and comforted me. Was that last night? No, two nights ago, I finally decided as memories of being in Chase’s arms flooded me. Today, I’d been at the training center and Kenneth assigned our final projects for his course. Flashes of walking around the abandoned building, and then . . . nothing.
When I opened my eyes again, the young woman sat on a twin mattress across from me and started chattering in Spanish. I couldn’t think fast enough in my disoriented state to translate, but I was able to pick out words that put me instantly on edge. Trapped. Prisoner. Bad men. None of those were encouraging.
My gaze wandered over my body, and I was relieved to find that I was still fully clothed in my Zenith uniform, though my boots were missing. The watch Kenneth gave me remained on my wrist, and it read seven minutes after five. That meant it had only been about an hour. Assuming days hadn’t passed while I’d been unconscious.
When I was feeling more in control, I inspected the room and tried not to freak out. I was in what appeared to be a small bedroom. The lone window was boarded up with two-by-fours, and the door was made of steel with no handle. A camera was mounted in the corner of the ceiling, and brown shag carpet hid stains I didn’t even want to think about. With the windows blocked, no sunlight filtered in and the only light in the room was from a plastic fixture with one bulb.
I had no idea where I was or what was going on, but I was in trouble. More trouble than ever before, and that was saying something.
Now that I was able to really look at the young woman across from me, I was struck by her beauty despite her baggy clothes, lack of makeup, and hair that looked like it hadn’t been brushed in days. She had dark, almost black hair and brown eyes a shade lighter that were framed by impossibly long lashes. Her dimples were so prominent that the grooves in her cheeks stood out even though there was no trace of a smile on her face.
“Where are we?” When she didn’t immediately respond, I realized she probably didn’t understand me. Although I could force myself to converse with her in Spanish, my head was throbbing so much, I had a feeling it wouldn’t go well. “¿Habla inglés?”
“Un poco.”
A little. Thank god. “I’m Haley. What’s your name?”
“Carmen.”
“It’s nice to meet you. Can you tell me where we are?”
I held my breath as I waited for her reply. Part of me didn’t want to know. The other part was trying to convince myself that I was in the middle of an elaborate Zenith training exercise. As much as I hoped that would be the result, my instincts told me this was something else. Something much worse.
She blinked back tears. “I don’t know.”
Tempted to hyperventilate, I forced myself to breathe normally. Think logically, Haley. This is what you’ve been training for.
“Do you know if we’re in San Jose?”
She shook her head.
“California?” My mind rejected the idea that I’d been unconscious for more than an hour, but I had to ask.
“Es posible,” she admitted, pulling her knees into her chest. “I hear a man with, uh . . .” She held her hands up in what was easily the international symbol for a handgun, and my heart sank even deeper to the ground.
“Gun?”
She nodded. “Man with gun say Disneyland. In California, sí?”
“Sí.”
That news gave me only the slightest bit of relief. The gun-carrying man probably wasn’t suggesting a trip to Disneyland, so who knew why he’d mentioned it. It was more important to figure out what day it was. Did my kidnappers drug me or just knock me out? Considering the knot on the back of my head and my current wooziness, I probably had at least a minor concussion, but I couldn’t tell if there were drugs lingering in my system.
“Do you know what day it is?”
She shook her head.
“How long have I been here?”
“Una hora, más o menos.”
An hour. That seemed like a good thing. Relatively, at least.
Carmen apologized for speaking in Spanish, and I assured her it was okay. Though my head was still pounding like a giant anvil had smashed into it, I was now alert enough to translate. If she spoke slowly. Very slowly.
I wanted to know more from her, but my immediate concern was escape. With every bit of strength I could muster, I stood, then bent over as the urge to vomit hit me hard. Yeah, I definitely have a concussion.
Knowing my effort would be in vain, I walked the few steps to the door and pushed against it with my full body weight. Nothing. I marched over to the window and groaned as I realized
there was a layer of plywood attached to the interior of the frame, in addition to the two-by-fours bolted to the wall. Why couldn’t they have been attached with rusty nails? I pulled on one of the boards out of desperation and only managed to get a splinter since it didn’t budge one little bit.
Trapped was right. The only way out of this room was through the door, which meant I needed to know more. When would the door open next, and who would be on the other side?
“Carmen, I need you to tell me everything.”
She looked hesitant, so I switched to Spanish and pleaded with her. I explained that I would do everything in my power to get us out of there, but I needed her help. That seemed to convince her, because she launched into her story. And with every word that I translated, my hope of getting out of this predicament dwindled.
A little over a week ago, in her small hometown in Mexico, Carmen had been approached by a well-dressed man who offered a chance to start over in the United States. He explained that he moved from Mexico to California as a young man and had slowly built up a successful hotel chain. Because he wanted others to have the same opportunities he’d had, he was looking for people to come work in his hotel. He promised safe passage across the border, a good-paying job, and a place to live.
She had been reluctant at first—it sounded too good to be true—but eventually she caved. He seemed so reputable and interested in helping her, she believed it had to be better than her current situation.
The next day, she and four other females, ranging in age from seventeen to thirty-five, were transported through Mexico and smuggled across the border in a cramped trailer pulled by a truck. Although they hadn’t been treated well by the two men driving the truck, the women assumed that was normal behavior for such a risky operation. It wasn’t until they arrived at the house that Carmen started to understand that she’d been lied to. The guards wouldn’t tell her anything, but she no longer believed she would be given the hotel job and apartment as promised.